A SERVING police officer from Barrow who jetted off to Las Vegas and conned more than £24,000 from friends and family will only repay £4,631 of his ill-gotten gains. 

Detective Constable Joel Williams, 33, took the luxury holiday after telling Dean Leith: “If you can’t trust a copper, who can you trust?” 

Williams, a fraud officer with Cumbria Constabulary, said he needed the money to complete a deal on a solar panel contract. It later emerged the deal had not been completed and Williams had taken the holiday to the USA, followed by a rugby tour, while his friend’s finances lay in tatters. 

Throughout 2013 and 2014 Williams conned £24,025.21 out of friends and family as his debts spiralled out of control. He was jailed for 21 months but a Proceeds of Crime hearing ordered him to repay just £4,631.70. 

Williams – who has since been sacked – also defrauded his ex-wife and his own mother to secure bank loans he was not eligible for. Now the disgraced officer, who made a career out of investigating others’ financial wrongdoings, is behind bars after pleading guilty to four counts of fraud and one of possession of a false identity document. 

During a search of his home, a passport in the name of Russell Henderson, which had been reported missing at Barrow police station several years earlier, was found. Williams, who worked for the financial intelligence unit for Cumbria Constabulary, had used the passport to apply for a loan, Preston Crown Court heard. 

Matters came to light when Williams’s ex-wife Louise checked her credit rating on Experian and discovered a loan which she hadn’t taken out had been defaulted on. Williams had used her details to borrow £5,000 from Tesco Finance and had paid it onto a pre-payment card with Tuxedo Loans,which he then used to make purchases. 

Other e-ccounts had been set up with Tuxedo using the details of his mother-in-law and his brother – although those accounts had never been used. However Williams had borrowed £10,000 from Santander using his mother Karen’s details. In a victim personal statement read to the court, his ex-wife Louise said: “How can he be so nice to me while he was taking £5,000 of my money? He is a police officer. 

“It has affected my credit rating and my future. I feel totally betrayed by him. 

“I would have helped him sort out his finances but he lied to me and that is what hurts the most.” 

Louise was approached by Mr Leith who told her Williams had said she would help repay the loan he had made to his friend. Williams, of Farnham Close, Barrow, had agreed to repay £12,000 within two months after borrowing the money from the builder. 

But when the money did not emerge and Williams jetted off to Las Vegas, Mr Leith was left struggling to pay his creditors in the building trade and unable to take a family of his own. On his return to the UK a cheque was posted through Mr Leith’s door, but when it was presented to the bank, it bounced. 

Mr Leith said: “I trusted him as a friend but he lied to me and made excuses after excuses. “I respected him. He’s a copper.” 

The court heard Williams received a chief constable’s commendation and a certificate from the Royal Humane Society after he attempted to resuscitate a man who was trying to take his own life. 

Judge Mark Brown, sentencing, said: “At the relevant time you were a serving police officer with Cumbria Constabulary as a detective constable in the intelligence unit. 

“You had undergone training in financial intelligence and you worked on investigations of fraud and money laundering. 

“It is this aspect and the fact you were a serving police officer that makes this case so serious. 

“You were expected to set an example of probity, honesty and integrity.” 

He jailed Williams for 21 months and ordered him to pay a statutory surcharge.